


Prompt: Counting Breaths

by EssayOfThoughts



Series: MCU Maximoff Oneshots [87]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Claustrophobia, Codependency, Gen, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-12
Updated: 2016-07-12
Packaged: 2018-07-23 14:19:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 759
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7466622
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EssayOfThoughts/pseuds/EssayOfThoughts
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Claustrophobia is never simple to deal with, least of all when it is born of deaths.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Prompt: Counting Breaths

**Author's Note:**

> Written for a prompt on my tumblr, readable [Here](http://essayofthoughts.tumblr.com/post/147289655565/prompt-wanda-and-pietro-have-a-panic-attack-being).

**i.**  
_Breathe, breathe, breathe._

Breath after breath after breath, their backs pressed to hard metal, air hot, stifling, too much.

This is nothing like Sokovia, like when they were ten, and yet it feels exactly alike.

 

* * *

 

 **ii.**  
_We chose this,_ Pietro thinks. He can feel his arm pressed to Wanda’s - they are both of them shaking.

_We chose this, we chose this, we chose this._

This doesn’t feel like a choice, though. This feels like… _Dust, rubble, the bed slats pressing into his ribs, cutting his skin open as he tries to shield Wanda, their eyes fixed on the small flashing light, the single word: STARK._

Pietro cannot breathe.

 

* * *

 

 **iii.**  
“They should be out by now,” Natasha says. Her face is pensive, knuckles pressed to her chin, thumbnail pressing into her lips. “This isn’t a difficult test.”

Bucky’s smile is a grin. “Not everyone is Soviet-trained, Natashenka.”

“They said they were ready,” Steve says, and he looks worried half to sickness. “They said they could handle this.”

“We all say things,” Bucky says, shrugging. “It doesn’t make it _true.”_

“Two more minutes,” Natasha says. “Then we call this a wash and start them on something easier.”

 

* * *

 

 **iv.**  
Wanda’s hand is tight around Pietro’s wrist. She can feel every bone there, how they all fit together and move as they each shake.

It is pitch darkness around them, but Wanda closes her eyes and _sees … Mama’s hand in the chasm below, fingers spasming, the flashing light from the unexploded shell glinting off her cheap wedding band. She can see Father’s boot if she stretches, but he stopped twitching long ago._

And then light breaks through the ceiling.

 

* * *

 

 **v.**  
“I’ve got this,” Bucky says. “Witch finds my mind calming, remember? I’ve got this.”

The chamber the twins are stuck in is small. The walls are all metal, each edge cast to shape and welded together. The doors are designed to slide shut as people enter, only opening after a hidden panel is accessed.

Bucky doesn’t need any of this though. He attaches a clip to his harness and rappels down to the box. There’s a door in the ceiling, sort of, metal made to be able to mould and remould itself.

Bucky digs his fingers in and thinks, _open up._

 

* * *

 

 **vi.**  
The twins are huddled in a corner, stock still but for shaking limbs and blinking eyes.

“Hey,” he says, pitching his voice low, crouching before them. He can see the scarlet in Wanda’s eyes, see how Pietro’s shakes have a touch of blur. He thinks at Wanda, opens his mind to her around a promise.

“Hey,” he says, stretching his metal hand towards them. “You’re safe.”

 

* * *

 

 **vii.**  
The mind Wanda can see is bleakly peaceful, like Pietro’s in some respects but not. Calm. Precise. Driven towards simple, singular aims, systems she can… _recognise_.

Wanda lets out a deep breath as she sees Bucky.

“Pietro,” she murmurs, her hand shifting on her brother’s wrist. “Pietro, we’re all right,” she says in Sokovian.

It is only at his sister’s words, his own language, that Pietro seems to truly see them.

“Pietro,” Wanda says, and he crumples against her side.

 

* * *

 

 **viii.**  
Bucky lifts Pietro out, because Wanda insists and her brother bows before her. Pietro’s feet are jittery and uncertain of the metal of the roof, skittering like a new foal on ice, but he stabilises quickly, breathes in cool air and Bucky can see how he is beginning to relax.

Wanda curls into him as he helps her out, red wisping out of fingers over the metalwork of his shoulder.

“Best not mess with the wiring,” he murmurs to her, softly teasing. “Don’t want my arm to lock up.”

Wanda’s voice is small but there. “It won’t,” she says. “The metal… it _resists_.”

 

* * *

 

 **ix.**  
Pietro takes Wanda when she is out, his arms held out, expression almost imperious as he silently demands to hold his sister.

He’s shaking slightly, still, but Bucky is sure of this: Pietro would no more hurt Wanda than he would Steve.

Wanda turns boneless in Pietro’s arms, her face tucked into her brother’s shoulder. Bucky’s hands are gentle as he guides them down steps, out the door, to the room of sofas and cushions and mugs of Clint’s hot chocolate.

“Bad memories,” Bucky says, handing them mugs. The twins nod, smoothly, silently, synchronously. “We all have them,” he says. “We just gotta learn what to do with them, how to deal with them.”

They sit in silence - not uncomfortably - and let understanding and acceptance soothe frayed nerves.

 

* * *

 

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are much appreciated!


End file.
